Repairs
by Samniss Arandeen
Summary: It is three days after the incident at BSL. What is "The Big One"? Why are there "Infected" running amok on SR-666? Why has Samus' arrest been ordered? And what has fried Samus' suit? Please rate and review, feedback is much appreciated on a work-in-progress such as this.
1. A New Mission

The monster crashed to the ground, having finally been defeated by Samus. It had once been her exact replica, then had grown to an enormous mutated mockery before finally yielding to the famed Bounty Huntress herself. As expected from all X, a blue gel core burst out of the creature, puffing with air as it floated away. Samus leapt after it, hoping to capture it for the abilities locked within it. But just as she did so, the core suddenly darted through the air and out of the room, oozing its way through some rubble blocking a passage beyond.

"Damn!" exclaimed Samus, denied both a potential resupply and assurance that her enemy had indeed been defeated. After all, that X could regenerate and come back. "Oh well," Samus shrugged as she jumped up to the top of the room, "This place is going to hell anyways. I'll see it there."

Her Fusion Suit aiding her, she reached a hatch at the very top of the tall, wide room. This hatch led into another, smaller room that resembled a starship's Bridge. The captain's chair and console were both directly in front of her as she came in, and a ring of operations stations surrounded a large holographic table in the very center. She strode to this table, and, tapping in a series of commands, finally reached the station's orbital controls. Right now, according to the readout, the station was nearing perigee. This was perfect news for Samus, it would make execution of her next command quite a bit easier.

"Deorbit maneuver in progress. Destination: SR-388. Arrival: three minutes" The space station's PA delivered this final message throughout the maze of its halls and chambers. As it did so, the station itself lurched as the thrusters began braking and lowering orbit.

There wasn't much time before the station's lack of reentry shielding would become apparent. Samus began her mad dash to the Docking Bay, as everything around her began crumbling. The station shook uncontrollably as the friction of the planet's atmosphere began to buffet the structure back and forth. Plasma erupted from power conduits which had shaken loose. Rubble from explosions littered the ground. And yet, Samus sprinted through it all, taking turns and sliding under obstacles, mantling over other obstacles, taking her body and Suit to the absolute limit in the race back to her ship.

"Arrival in two minutes." the PA announced just as she emerged through the Docking Bay access, only to see the empty berth where her ship should have been. "What the hell?" asked Samus aloud to herself.

She tried to raise her ship's computer on her comm channels, but before she could finish, a loud shriek echoed through the chamber. From the shadows across the room emerged the giant reptilian beast known as Omega Metroid; towering ten feet tall and brandishing its massive claws, it lunged at Samus without warning. The surprised heroine was barely able to leap back to avoid being batted across the room by the enraged creature.

She quickly assessed the threat coming at her, and knowing Metroids of all types were vulnerable to ice, quickly armed her Ice Missiles. The Omega Metroid had been staggered by its near miss, leaving its belly vulnerable. Samus let her first shot off, and the Missile hit the intended target. Strangely, however, the Metroid survived the hit. Samus tapped the Missile trigger in her Arm Cannon again, and once more her Missile struck home But again, the Metroid was entirely unaffected.

Then the Metroid regained its surprise advantage. Despite its immense mass, it suddenly jumped high in the air! Samus could only tuck and roll under the Omega as it came down. She had not quite finished her dodge roll yet as her enemy landed, and the tremor knocked Samus to the ground. To regain her footing, she crunched her legs to spring up from the ground, but it was too late. The Omega Metroid planted its foot on Samus, then the other foot, pinning her down. None of Samus' retaliatory Beam shots even fazed the thing, as it kept beating her into the ground. Samus could only watch and wait as her body was slammed into the ground again and again, her suit's shield energy depleting rapidly with each hit.

Then, from nowhere, salvation arrived in the form of an Ice Beam shot. Said shot hit the belly of the beast dead on, driving the beast back and off of her pinned self. As the Omega screeched in pain Samus, now luckily freed from death's grasp, rolled aside. She knew that her shield had been damaged heavily, to the point of triggering the "low energy" siren, and now there were two potential threats. She looked in the direction from whence the shot had come, and saw her mimicry standing in the hatch, Arm Cannon still raised at the Omega.

The SA-X began charging at the beast, its copy Speed Booster accelerating it to almost untraceable speeds. As it did so, it fired its Ice Beam again and again, until finally it was upon the Metroid, where SA-X used its momentum to somersault over.

But the SA-X had been weakened during its earlier fight with Samus, and as the Omega swiped above its head in a counterattack, this became evident. The X doppelganger was launched back the way it had come, slamming to the ground in a final slump of defeat. As it did so, the Core again emerged from the form it had taken, oozing out of the replica armor plating.

"Not this time," Samus said as she planted her boot on the escaping Core. Her Suit readily absorbed the Core's gelatinous substance into itself, and then into Samus' body. Just like all the thousands of X she had absorbed before, she absorbed the energies and data within, as if were food for her body and mind. This one, however, happened to be special. The suit shielding was suddenly recharged to its maximum. The Beam weapon finally gained its last upgrade, the one weapon Samus had had to go without the entire mission. Indicating this, the suit's Visor flashed a message across the screen, "Ice Beam Restored."

The PA chirped again, "Arrival in one minute."

Samus immediately acted, turning back to the Omega Metroid and pelting its belly with her Beam once more. Her new Ice Beam combined well with the other upgrades to the Beam, causing each strike to inflict massive damage. Aside from its loud shrieking of pain, the Omega could do nothing but try in vain to block the Bounty Huntress' shooting. And as thirty seconds remained on the clock, the Omega finally submitted to Samus' hail of fire, crashing down spectacularly in its final fall to death.

There was one last problem to be resolved. The armored huntress turned back to the berth where her ship should have been. Almost as if it were scheduled, the purple spaceship swooped in, lowering its ramp so she could leap into the craft. After her jump into her waiting ship, with the ramp closed behind her, it finally pulled away for good. Samus quickly made her way to the cockpit, taking a seat in her chair as the ship reoriented.

The space station, upon which Samus had conducted the mission, was now consumed in the fireball of reentry. In quite a spectacular fashion, began to disintegrate, shredding itself apart as it plummeted through the atmosphere of planet SR-388. The station split into several flaming fragments, which rained down on the surface. As the final, largest segment hit, and as Samus looked on, the bright flash of light seemed to cover the whole visible side of the planet.

"Well, at least all the X were destroyed," remarked Samus as she removed her suit's helmet.

"Heavy-duty space station reactors make great nukes," replied Adam, the artificial intelligence inhabiting and piloting the ship, "Threat eliminated. X parasites both on the ship and planetside have zero percent chance of survival."

THREE DAYS LATER

The stars that had once been mere lines now faded into the little points of light that they normally were, and the planet lingered in the bottom of the viewport.

"Here we are," Adam told Samus as he put the ship into orbit, "SR-666, the planet we got that distress signal from. According to the records, a Federation terraforming project is underway here."

"Well, the distress said something about containment going wrong," replied Samus as she gazed out the viewport to the lush, green and blue planet below.

"Yes, it did," responded Adam, "but this planet has an unusually thick and powerful ionosphere. Comm systems aren't designed to pierce such an intense blanket of interference, and scanners can't discern the readings from the atmosphere's trickery. Because of this, I can't reach anyone or see anything on the surface."

"Well, that means only one thing. It means we have to set down so I can scout out what's going on."

Adam pulled the ship down from orbit and began entry into the atmosphere. "Exactly. But where to land?"

The small purple gunship lowered further and further towards the planetary surface, and it was here that Samus finally could see the true beauty of the surface. As the ship skimmed over the treetops of the lush, green forest below, she could see a massive lake nearby, gleaming with the sunlight reflecting off of its nearly calm surface. Beyond it, a mountain straight out of a classical painting had seemingly risen from the ground and soared to the heavens above. Lava could be seen running down portions of its surface, stream after stream of molten rock flowed from the summit back to the surface below.

The dense forest the ship was flying over soon gave way to a vast, nearly blank grassland. It was here that Samus could finally see some of the structures that dotted the area, and to the relief of Adam, one of those structures was in fact a landing platform. Adam dropped the landing gear, and with a few last thruster burns, placed the ship perfectly atop the circle of tarmac. The engines powered down, the hatch opened, and Samus stepped onto the lift, letting it carry her up through the open hatch on top of the ship.

Samus spun a full circle from her vantage point, taking a look at what was around her, before finally leaping down with practiced grace to the surface proper.


	2. Something Amiss

The tower, nestled perfectly on the border between the lush forest and the expansive grassland, rose three stories into the air. While not quite as tall as the massive trees around it, it still was rather large, being wide and stout. The scenes of nature surrounding it starkly contrasted the static, lifeless gray facility. Near the top of the tower, distinctly marking it, a symbol had been painted, but had since faded. The trademark star surrounded by a swirl of red, green and blue was still recognizable, though. It was the symbolic flag of the Galactic Federation.

Judging by its size, Samus guessed it was an outpost. A lone tower like this doesn't even stand a remote chance of sustaining an entire terraforming operation, she thought to herself as she found the entrance: a large blast door embedded on the grassland side of the lowest level. To its left glowed a control panel of sorts, a numerical keypad displayed across its touch surface.

Being a Bounty Hunter, she entered her identity code into the pad and then rested her armored palm on it. As they usually were, the pad switched to a yellow glow, meaning that while her passcode and palm reading were correct, she still had to be let in by command personnel. After all, Bounty Hunters still weren't allowed into sensitive areas without permission. This was a good thing if it were a populated installation, as it allowed tighter security to the juicy secrets sure to be within. But after a few minutes of waiting, she knew something was amiss.

Quickly, she hailed Adam. "Are you up for some hacking? I entered my codes, but it seems no one's home."

To her disappointment, he replied, "The interference is too overpowering, Samus. Data transmissions are out of the question unless we can get better comm systems. I barely have enough bandwidth to send you my voice reliably, and I can tell you don't, either." Samus had to agree with this, Adam's voice was quite scrambled by the effective barrage jamming from the atmosphere.

Samus looked up at the top of the tower, and an idea came into her head. "Well then, what about landing on top of it? It looks like the ship can fit on its roof."

"I probably couldn't locate the roof without crashing into it unless I had Navigation Beacons to guide me in. You'll have to find another way in. But if you make it to the roof, and it has those beacons, feel free to activate them. Adam out."

Samus took one last look at the seemingly impassible door. She knew demolishing it wouldn't be a problem.

SCAN VISOR DATA: This door is locked by a high-security system requiring hand scan as well as passcode entry. The lock assembly is made of Talloric Alloy and is intended to stop most intruding wildlife from entering uninvited.

Samus grinned as she realized what she needed to do. At the thought, her suit began to curl up, and she could feel herself crumple into a ball as her armor reformed around her. The end result of the transformation was an object about the same size as a basketball rolling up to the door, seemingly on its own, laying a glowing blue packet of energy underneath itself. It detonated, and its knockback sent the autonomous orb flying upward, where it left another one of those blue packets right in front of the lock mechanism itself.

As the orb landed, the second Bomb detonated, shattering the lock in front of which it had been set. Samus exited her Morph Ball alternate form, resuming bipedal travel as she placed her free hand inside the hole of the destroyed lock and pulled. She labored as hard as she could, straining to peel the door open. Eventually, with her suit's augmented strength aiding her, she managed to budge the door open wide enough for her to get through.

Inside the tower itself, the light came from what few ambient lights remained. It reminded Samus of some of her earlier missions, how the enemy had taken advantage of the dark, gloomy environments to take her by surprise. It was these conditions that really made her wish she still had her Thermal Visor that she'd gotten back on Tallon IV. She treaded carefully, taking each step with deliberation, Arm Cannon held at the ready.

With nary a sound except for each of Samus' footfalls and the flickering lights, she knew that it was too quiet around here. She could not see any signs of movement, of life, of anything aside from the lingering aura of death. Papers and broken electronics crunched under her boots; with metallic ringing sounds, spent ammo casings scattered with some of the armored heroine's ironclad steps. A battle had happened here, but how? Everything was sealed up tight, with the highest of security, and there were no dead bodies to speak of. So why did this appear to be a battleground, Samus wondered to herself.

Near the stairs leading off the first floor onto the second, Samus located a body clad in Federation Power Armor. From what she could see, this person hadn't had a very good death. The armor's finish had been scratched up, dinged and dented and more than a few pieces of the plating had been pried off. The nearby staircase had a few of the missing pieces on it, as well as more of those ammo casings. Several meters away from the body lay a very large rifle, complete with large magazine, that upon closer inspection revealed itself to be the correct caliber for the scattered casings.

"So this man was fighting. But what?" Samus thought aloud to herself she moved to inspect the corpse. It lay face up, and she could actually see through the shattered visor into the face within, all blood-soaked and with a face petrified with horror. Those eyes were locked wide open, as was the mouth as if it was crying out in fear. It nearly made Samus Aran herself, the seasoned veteran of bounty hunting, flinch away.

SCAN VISOR DATA: Galactic Federation Trooper identified as Ssgt. V. Cortez. Retrieving surviving helmet-cam footage and recording to Logbook.

The Logbook was how Samus kept track of the data stored within her Suit's memory systems. Calling up its interface, she browsed through it until she found the helmet-cam footage she had just downloaded. Maybe it could shed some light on what's going on here, Samus thought as she opened the file.

Immediately the Visor displayed the film viewer, and the film was a grisly sight. Creatures that looked suspiciously human kept lunging at the camera, which was itself jerking around as its operator was brandishing a rifle, identical to the one found on the ground, against them. The trooper could be heard yelling over the automatic gunfire and the screeches of the monsters, "FUCKING DIE ALREADY!" Samus watched further as the creatures sustained multiple gunshot wounds to their chests at the hands of the trooper, but kept getting back up and attacking with seemingly superhuman strength and durability. They were leaping insane distances, leaping off of walls and slashing, grabbing, and striking with unfettered raw power. The film finally ended in a burst of static as a flat palm struck the camera, while the audio track played a shattering sound and what Samus assumed was the trooper's cry of death shortly after.

Samus exited her Logbook and turned back to the deceased. Kneeling down on one knee beside the body, she reached over to the frozen face, and paid respects to the fallen as she closed the eyes and mouth of his face through the broken faceplate of the helmet.


	3. Another Arrival

The trail of spent casings, footprints and a strange orange fluid led up the staircase to the next floor. This one looked like a command center of some sort, computer stations and holographic projector boards covering the entire space. Samus quickly identified one of the ones closest to the middle as the commander's post, it was the largest of them all and was the only one still with power. Everything else in the room was dead, as was to be expected from severed main power. The backups were only hooked up to emergency lighting, medical equipment, and of course the commander's post.

Samus walked up to it with a bit of trepidation. Whatever had killed that man earlier might still be here. The noise she had made so far may have actually attracted them. Nevertheless, she trained her Scan Visor on the rapidly flashing console and awaited the result.

SCAN VISOR DATA: Official Log, Southbound Outpost Command downloaded. Contents recorded to Logbook.

Again, she called up the data screens in her Visor, accessing the data banks of her Suit. She accessed the text file that had been downloaded from the console, and it read:

"The Main Facility has fallen. As of 0900, everyone within has been infected and the Big One is now rampant. The larger posts with docking facilities have evacuated in whatever spaceships they had. The rest of the spacecraft are in the Main Facility itself, deep inside Infected ground. We cannot regroup quickly enough to hold out against them, for they have destroyed most of the high-speed tram lines in their rapid spread, and supplies dwindle rapidly. We're fucked."

The text faded back into the view of Samus' surroundings as she tried to piece together what was going on. The Big One? Infected? Her mind lurched into high gear at some of her thoughts. Is the Big One a virus or mutagen of some kind? The description of its effects certainly reminded her of the Phazon she had spent a year of her life fighting.

After a few seconds of brainstorming, she managed to get a grip on her own mind. Something about this planet was amiss, and unsettlingly so.

Another staircase led up from this second floor to the roof. The hatch slid open, and the armored heroine strode out onto the upper surface of the tower's summit. Aside from the hatch she had come through, the roof bore little more than a small control panel on a pedestal, four short, stubby antennae arranged in a square pattern...and within those four antennae, a circle of tarmac presumably intended for shuttlecraft.

The Scan Visor made short work of the control panel, and the four antennae revealed themselves. Telescoping out to twice their original length, the Navigation Beacons began transmitting their signals to guide ships in to land.

Through the comm static, Adam chimed in. "I see you've activated a set of beacons. I'm coming to your location now." Sure enough, almost immediately the distinctive purple hull of Samus' gunship launched into the air, flew across the distance, and touched down atop the tower Samus had just visited. The landing gear set down, the hatch up top opened, and she jumped up with her augmented jumping to get inside.

Samus took her seat at the captain's chair of her ship, surprised at the rapidly flickering displays on all screens. Usually Adam was considerate enough to wait until she had filled him in on everything (and eaten something) before the infodumps and technobabble. But, then again, Adam normally didn't immediately fly to every landing zone she had discovered. "I take it something big has happened?" she asked the AI.

The voice of Adam came back loud and clear, starkly contrasting the static that had pervaded their radio conversations. "Yes. Very big. I don't know exactly what, though."

"But I thought you said your sensors were jammed by the atmosphere?"

"Yes, that is true, but I can still measure the disturbances within the atmosphere itself, such as those generated as objects move through it. Though you're probably not interested in such technical matters.

"The size, speed and direction of these disturbances tell me that something big entered atmosphere somewhere right around here." The frontal display showed a rudimentary map pointing out the relative locations of the first landing point and their current location, with a third, more northerly point marked in red. "I don't have a terrain map of this planet, so I can't plot a route. But what I can do is calculate the radius within which it probably landed." A red circle wrapped around the corresponding red point.

"I wonder if they're Federation investigators or evacuation personnel," replied Samus as she studied the map and downloaded the marked waypoints into her suit. "Or, if it's just a meteorite."

"I wonder, too. That's why you need to go out there and make sure of their intentions, and render assistance if necessary."

"Alright, then," finished Samus as she rose from her chair to disembark. But then she remembered something. "Oh, and Adam? I found these in the tower." She queued up, then transferred, the two Logbook entries she had obtained into Adam's memory banks.

"Okay. I'll see about what's going on. You go out there and investigate the space object."

It was about forty-five minutes of traveling, trial, and error, but finally Samus figured out the path through the forest to the red point on her map. It must have been where the ship or whatever entered, it may have flown off to find somewhere else to land. It had to have, too. This spot, just like most of the rest of the forest, was thickly lined with trees. There were no scorch marks or craters to speak of, either, not even a single visible fire! Samus deduced that it had to have been a ship, and continued her search.

Eventually, a ship revealed itself. Parked in a clearing just barely big enough for it, the gunmetal spacecraft sported quite a few familiar markings. The black and gold striping along the wing edges signified a special military vehicle. The numbers emblazoned on the side identified it among its bretheren among the hordes of space traffic. Finally, near the nose viewport, a Galactic Federation insignia had been boldly marked on both sides. Samus made these observations from deep in the woods, hiding behind the trees to remain unseen.

SCAN VISOR DATA: The GFS Kyoto is a Nord-class dropship that serves as the living quarters, adaptable cargo space and battle insertion vehicle of its assigned cadre of soldiers. The Kyoto's particular assignment as of three days ago is the fledgling 501st Infantry Division. Due to this unit's relatively small roster, the majority of this ship has been converted into extra munitions and supplies storage, allowing the 501st to venture out further than other, larger units.

Several people in what appeared to be Federation Power Armor were flitting around at the landing site, placing crates all over the place, unboxing supplies, and various other tasks presumably to prepare for their ground exploration. Samus calmly strode in, knowing that Federation personnel by and large knew who she was and why she was a good person to have around.

But much to her surprise, as she approached, a dozen Federation soldiers, all with bizarre variants of the standard armor, surrounded her. Before she could even utter a single word, they formed a circle around her and raised their weapons.

"Samus Aran. By order of the Federation High Council, you are under arrest."


	4. Arresting the Huntress

The utterance came from the man immediately behind her. Samus' instincts told her to whip around and face her threat, but just as she twitched, the man spoke again. "No monkey business, Aran. Just get in the holding cell and we'll be fine."

Without moving, Samus replied, "On what charges?"

"You are being held responsible for the fiasco at the Biologic Space Laboratories. Now get in the holding cell, or we'll put you there!"

Immediately Samus wanted to protest her charges, but she remembered just in time that doing so wouldn't do any good. Instead, without warning, she pushed off the ground, allowing her Power Suit to launch her high into the air in a somersault. A flip and a landing later, she had her Arm Cannon pointed at her assailants. A preliminary headcount on her part let her know twelve enemies crossed her warpath.

"Now, I'd like to know how you'll put me anywhere," Samus challenged her enemies.

Immediately, the soldiers threw Samus a large wall of gunfire as alarms started blaring from the ship. She lunged to her right, rolling on the ground in an evasive maneuver, recovering just in time to see three of them demonstrating jumping power on par with her own. She executed another rolling dodge, this time moving under the jumping enemies, only to feel a series of heavy impacts on her back afterward as the other nine hit their mark.

Samus turned around to face her attackers once more, this time returning the favor with Power Beam shots to the group of riflemen. No hits were scored, as they did similar rolls to get out of the way, but at least it made them stop firing at her. Without missing a beat, Samus leapt up to the top of the ship and turned to meet the first following jumper. Her turn gave her the momentum to lift a leg in a roundhouse kick, and the unfortunate soldier received an armored boot to the side of the head just as he landed. As his body rolled off the side of the ship, another jumper sailed through the air, fast approaching her side. She barely rotated into firing position when he landed and ducked under her Arm Cannon. Samus responded with a frontal kick, expertly blocked by the combatant.

The failed kick turned into a problem, the enemy grabbed her leg and began to execute a judo throw. Quick thinking prevailed for Samus, though, as her armor again curled up around her, forming her Morph Ball. The thrower, realizing his adversary's leg escaping his grasp a hair too late, turned around to promptly catch a breast plate full of mule kick and a launch off the top of the ship.

Her kick flowed seamlessly into a third dodging roll, barely avoiding a missile shot. The roll did not, however, flow seamlessly into another maneuver. As she recovered from it, a follow-up missile struck home, jostling the Huntress around a bit and opening her up to more fire.

A realization struck Samus as she shook off the blast and jumped off the top of the ship. Their guns' reports sounded similar to her own! Sure, it was more rapid-fire than her own, but that unmistakable firing sound erupted from her enemy's weaponry.

Similar guns...Missiles...unprecented mobility...she wasn't fighting herself, she was fighting multiple copies of herself! Noticing more of them pouring out of the ship's hatch as some of the original twelve closed in on her, she knew she was in for more than she planned.

Samus dove into the nearby woods, bobbing and weaving through the trees to avoid the enemy weapons fire. The three jumpers kept steady pace behind and to the sides of her...wait, make that five jumpers, according to her in-Visor radar display, as two more of them joined in the display of incredible speed and agility through the forest. Every trick Samus knew to throw pursuit, these five matched perfectly, even as they shot at their target. Retracing her steps, Samus hoped to get to a decent fighting spot. If running wasn't going to work, she thought, she may as well put up a challenge.

That plan quickly went out the window as she suddenly found her left leg immobile. A sensation of cold accompanied the lock-up as she stumbled into the dirt. However, she pulled off another display of her Fusion Suit's advanced musculature, applying enough brute force to shatter the ice encasing her leg joints.

WARNING: ENEMY LOCK

In the distraction of enemy Ice Beam weaponry, another noted similarity, one of them managed to get a fix on her. With no time to react, and no countermeasures to speak of, the lock completed.

And Samus' visor went static before fizzling out, taking all Suit power with it.

One of the armored personnel approached her with a strange electronic box. He tapped away at it as his comrades moved in behind him, and as Samus' suit rebooted.

The box left the man's hand, and a fraction of a second later, the man found himself ensnared in the grip of the Grapple Beam and hurled into the tree behind Samus. The box itself landed square on her back, exposed from the throw, and sprouted a multitude of wires which embedded in the Fusion Suit's membrane.

Samus, not noticing the attachment of the strange device, led the pursuit out of the woods and back out onto the grassland which had originally greeted her arrival. Taking advantage of the wide open spaces, she began to run faster, and faster, and faster, the Speed Booster activating and sending her rocketing forward. As she soon discovered, though, she was far from the only person using one.

"Samus! Samus! What's going on?" Adam's voice came in over the radio, much to Samus' relief.

"The Federation want me imprisoned! They've copied my abilities! I'm outgunned!" Samus replied, continuing her sprint across the field with the Federation hot on her heels.

"I was hoping this wouldn't happen," responded the AI. "I knew there'd be repercussions, but not..."

The comlink died, and to Samus' horror, so did everything else. Massive discharges of electricity arced into her suit from the box through the wires, sending a massive disabling charge coursing through her. Suddenly lacking stability control, her momentum sent her tumbling forward at triple-digit speeds to finally come to a halt, on her back, powerless.

The musculature of the Suit began convulsing as if having a seizure, flopping Samus around inside. POP! POP! POP! One by one the Suit's fuses blew, cutting power in a vain attempt to rescue the Suit's more sensitive components from the voltage surge and the massive short-circuiting. With a final convulsion, the battle ended as the heavily damaged Suit went dead once more, slamming Samus' head hard into the ground.


	5. A Chance Meeting

The chorus of ringing ears greeted Samus as she awoke from unconsciousness. Through a flashing Visor shone a bright white light that temporarily blinded her, at least until she managed to move her left arm to shade against the harsh illumination. The Suit had partially powered back up, but large portions of it simply weren't responding. This didn't surprise Samus, who had had to ride out that voltage surge coursing through her prized armorsuit.

What did surprise her was the sight that awaited her when she pushed herself up into a sitting position. A set of four drab, cold concrete walls surrounded her in all directions, capped by a similarly cold and drab floor and ceiling. A large metal hatch adorned one of the walls, this was the only exit from the room. Nestled in one of the upper corners was a security camera, sweeping the whole room and relaying its sight to parts unknown.

The basic movement systems were just now coming back online, and her eyes soon adjusted to the light. It took surprisingly little effort on her part to get back on her feet and walking about, but just as she did, an announcer came over a PA system within the room.

"It appears you chose the hard way, Aran," boomed the baritone voice, "and you still end up in our maximum-security cell. The Federation High Council will not appreciate what you've done.

"Don't even attempt to escape. You're in a double-walled cell enveloped in a blast-resistant force field doubling as a Faraday cage. Even if you did manage to break out, you've got us to fight through all over again."

_I swear I know that voice_. Samus was sure she knew the voice. Was it someone from her past? Or was it just coincidence?

A different voice picked up, "And that scenario is before taking into account your Suit damage. Nothing works! Almost every circuit in that Fusion Suit of yours is fried. It's best if you remain in your cell and await your trial. There's nowhere to run. There's nowhere to hide. There's nothing to do either one with."

The next several hours were just waiting. Occasionally a system would come back online, such as the Arm Cannon (minus the Missile Launcher), pieces of the navigation and Visor systems, and the blast shield. To try to kill the boredom, she took aim at the camera, then sent a Power Beam shot right at it. The shot hit its mark dead on; were it not for the force field, the camera would have been obliterated.

The same secondary gruff voice replied, "Destructive, aren't you, Aran? Even as your destroying days come to an end?"

Samus remained silent, and so did the announcers. And on dragged the verbal stalemate.

And on. And on. And on.

With the sudden sound of rending metal, a force pulled the armored Samus towards a side wall of the cell. She found herself sliding along the floor, then landing on her back on said wall with an enormous SLAM! As she got up, she realized the wall she was now standing on had turned into the floor. Gravity had somehow rotated itself ninety degrees, and had taken the force fields out as it did so. Well, that's one obstacle down, Samus mused, but it had created quite another. Her suit's musculature hadn't been spared the massive damage the rest of the suit had suffered, it wasn't up to the task of hauling her up through the cell door opening. That very thing also depended on her ability to blow open the door itself.

Another gravitational shift turned the ceiling into the new floor, firmly planting Samus upon that as well. "Okay, what the hell?"

As Samus asked aloud, the door swung open, revealing one of the armored troopers from earlier. With the same voice Samus couldn't quite put her finger on, he called out, "I hope you don't fancy a rubble trap!

Just as Samus exited the door from her cell, both herself and her ironclad savior found themselves drawn straight down the cell block hall to a corner. Standing on a wall once more, Samus followed the mysterious person through the hallways, and as the "floor" wobbled beneath them, the Federation trooper kicked open a hatch. "There's our evac!" he exclaimed.

Samus jumped through the hatch opening, ran a distance away to make sure of her safety, and looked back on what had just happened. Just beyond her rescuer, just running away from the ship as she had before, the ship itself had been overturned onto one of its sides. Before she could look on any further, the trooper grabbed her by the wrist. "Come on! If we get out, we can lose them!"

Samus, following, replied, "Who's 'them' and how did the ship get like that?"

The two of them ran into a trench in the ground, retreating further away from the ship as it took a final tumble downhill into another patch of forest below. Finally stopping, the trooper surprised his charge. He lifted his visor, and the face beneath uttered, "Remember me?"

"I do remember you. I don't remember your promotion." Surprised, Samus could barely react to what she looked upon.

"Well, I was promoted," remarked the soldier. "It's Commander Higgs now. Got my own command and everything."

"Well, good for you, Anthony," replied Samus, with a slap to Anthony's face. "Did you remember the 'Princess' on the receiving end of that command?"

"Yeah, of course I did. That's why I was selected for this particular assignment. They wanted people who knew you personally."

"So they could arrest me for what happened?"

"We both know the Federation's reports of the incident are total bullshit. You saw what happened there, and I trust you enough to take your word for what happened there."

"Then why undertake the mission to arrest me?"

"That was my plan to get to you, to tell you what's up and help you out. Doesn't hurt that I got out of a court martial for doing this."

"What about your men?" Samus asked after a brief pause.

"Unfortunately, I can't reach any of them. There's too much atmospheric interference, and we were all scattered during the fight earlier."

"The same problem prevents me from getting regular contact with my ship." Samus noticed a silhouette in the night sky. "What's that building over there?"

"Central Operations. It's a hive in there now. I don't recommend going in there, especially not in your current condition."

"I know who to blame," Samus quipped. "And a hive of what?"

"Infected," informed Anthony. "Billions of self-replicating nanites that predate our discovery of, and arrival on, this rock. They harvest DNA they come into contact with and eat away at bodies from the inside out. Or at least that's what the briefing told me."

"And the society of nanites, then, is 'The Big One'?" Samus could see the puzzle pieces come together in her head.

"If that's the name they referred to it by, then it sure is. We just call it Dread."

"Adam needs to know this," replied Samus. "Help me find some high ground. The signal has a better chance out in the open."

With about fifteen minutes of effort, the pair found a suitable hilltop. With a wide field of view and relative lack of obstruction, Samus swiveled around 360 degrees as her radio equipment scanned for the communications broadcast.

"Got lock," Samus chimed. "Adam, are you still out there?"

"Samus. I'm glad you got out of there. I was worried you had been killed." Adam had a hint of cheer in his voice, but it seemed something else had mostly pushed that feeling back in him. "Listen, I have a couple of strangely armored Federation personnel right alongside me. They appeared to have been running from something."

"Warmongers?" Samus asked, remembering her earlier scan.

"I wouldn't know who those are. Unless you're familiar with them."

"All too well. Anyway, where are you?"

Adam finished the call just before a wave of interference cut it off completely, "Right where you left me."

Samus checked her map, then turned back to Anthony. "Adam's that way, about a forty-five minute journey." She pointed in the direction her map indicated the last stored landing location.


	6. Salvation

Chapter Six

The tower remained deserted when the pair reached it. Re-entering the door Samus had forced open before, the two advanced through the littered corridors and rooms. Anthony couldn't help but wonder what had happened here, just as Samus had earlier. "What in the name of?..."

His question was promptly cut short by a loud screech. "As of that noise, I'm wondering the same thing," Samus remarked. She carefully made her way forwards, cautious of what could be lurking. Fortunately, nothing emerged as the two surmounted the tower.

Well, almost nothing. As Samus and Anthony reached the door to the roof of the building, the sounds of Adam's engines erupted in an angry roar, as did the screeching. They stepped out onto the roof itself just in time to see Adam fly off, with a humanoid creature clinging onto one of the skin panels.

Adam burst through the radio static. "Samus! Get this thing off of me! I can't shake it!"

Samus shouted back, "Do a barrel roll!"

Despite the suggested maneuver, the creature displayed an incredibly iron grip even through the intense G-forces of the roll. It still adhered to the spacecraft's skin as Adam made a dive back towards Samus and Anthony.

Then, when the distance was close enough for Samus to be sure of her shooting, she pelted it with Power Beam shots. Soon after, Anthony joined in, bursts of fire erupting from his own weapon. But even their combined fire couldn't knock the beast off its chosen perch. "Man, the hide on that thing!" Anthony exclaimed in exasperation as Adam banked and turned, then rocketed back towards the tower.

"Outta the way!" Adam exclaimed over the comlink just before buzzing the tower with millimeters to spare...between the tower and the wing with the creature on it. Even its tremendous grip couldn't save it from being plastered against the wall it had just been plowed hard into.

Surprisingly, however, the unknown monstrosity did, in fact, survive. Its humanoid face unsurprisingly pancaked into its head and bleeding red all over, it staggered up from the roof where the impact had thrown him. No, scratch 'humanoid', Samus thought to herself, make that 'human'...unmistakably human, even though it possessed forbidden strength and moved about like a demented soul. The thing limped a few steps towards the pair...

SCAN VISOR DATA: Unknown creature consists of elements of many different creatures blended into one. Mixture is inconsistent and is predominantly Human. Scans also indicate faint electronic presence.

Reverting out of Scan Visor, Samus remarked, "That didn't help." Then she lined up her crosshairs against the head of the demonic creature and fired. The shot hit home, finishing the wounded creature and causing it to crumble into a limp bag of meat. "But I guess that did."

"Wha...how the hell? What the FUCK is that thing?" Anthony seemed to be out of words to describe the spectacle in front of him. He was timely greeted by Adam swooping in to set down once more. Luckily, damage remained superficial; a panel on the right wing surface peeled up and back, but the components below remained intact. The characteristic purple hull gleamed in the moonlight as it rested on the landing pad atop the tower. As Samus and Anthony approached, the ship invitingly illuminated its front viewport once more.

"Samus, where have you been? Who is this I detect near you?"

"It's a long story, Adam," replied the reputed Bounty Huntress. "And I'm rather ashamed that you don't remember this person. You once were his commanding officer."

The visor obscuring her companion's face swiveled up. "Remember me?" he asked.

"Yes, I do, actually," replied the AI, this time on the external loudspeaker. "I don't remember you wearing that armor or that rank patch."

Anthony chuckled. "This stuff rolled out a week ago. My unit was the first to get our hands on it."

Adam replied, "I detect similarities to known Chozo technology."

Anthony informed Adam, "Our briefing told us this was based on Chozo technology. We learned plenty about it performing maintenance on Samus' suit."

So that's how their weapons were so similar to my own, thought Samus to herself.

"That same briefing also told us we were going to hunt Samus Aran. I knew something was fishy right then and there."

Adam replied to Anthony's explanation almost immediately. "That explains why Samus came under attack. She hailed me shortly before losing contact telling me you guys were attacking her."

"Sorry about that, Samus," Anthony made an aside to her, then back to Adam, "I was going to order my men to be a bit softer, but they went along against my orders and got their target. The only reason I went on this mission was to get to you two."

Adam replied, "Keep going." Samus, knowing Adam, prepared to leap out of the way should the AI open fire.

"I knew from the start that Samus got a bounty on her head. They chose me to lead the charge to capture her, knowing that I used to be a close friend. I thought I'd use that opportunity to help you out. I know the charges against you involving BSL are nothing but a load of bullshit."

"And how do I know you're not just saying that to fool us?" The Gunship's underside laser Gatling guns descended from their storage compartments and promptly spun up.

Anthony saw the ship maneuvering to get him in the line of sight, and answered honestly. "Because I brought with me twenty men who believe the same, and we need to work together to get off this rock and out of the Big Fed's sight!"

After a silent standoff between the three entities lasting the galaxy's longest minute, Adam disarmed, unlocking the topside hatch. "Both of you. Inside. Now." Both armored warriors happily agreed.

Samus reclined back in her captain's chair as it rolled into suit maintenance position. Five seconds of scanning later, Adam asked, "What in hell could have caused this kind of damage? All the systems appear to be overloaded by some sort of high voltage. Is there some sort of high-output weapon I don't know about?"

Anthony answered, "I'd guess the Neutralizer. The techies designed it specifically for taking out Samus' suit."

"They're very good at their jobs, I'll give them that," replied Samus. "I don't have much in the way of a suit anymore, thank you very much."

"I'll pass the word onto them next time I see them," commented Anthony. "To tell you the truth, half the Neutralizer was a wild mass guess. I'm still shocked at how well it worked."

"One more pun like that out of you and I'll beat your ass," Samus stated firmly, shaking her free hand in a fist.

"If your joking is over, I'd like to shed some good news as well." Adam assumed his usual serious tone.

"I sure could use some of that today," muttered Samus to the computerized commander.

"The news is twofold: these components are still usable...somewhat. They aren't quite as effective as they once were, nor can they take much punishment.

"The current spike also triggered a hidden ability of sorts in the armor. Samus, I can detect the old Chozo components trying to self-restore back to their former condition. They can't stand up to the stresses of supporting damaged components, but my hypothesis is that pretty soon, they won't have to anymore. I think this hidden mechanism is how Chozo tech could sit there for decades, if not centuries, and still be usable when the next randy spluenker comes by and takes it. It all takes energy from the surroundings and keeps itself in repair. Naturally, Chozo tech also uses this to fix itself up after major battle damage, or after having enormous sections of it amputated. Of course, the Federation tech grafted onto it when-"

Samus made it clear she wasn't an engineer. "Yadda yadda, just cut the technobabble and tell me what it means."

"You can still use all your abilities, but good things come to those who wait, in this case for your suit to finish fixing itself."

In his usual military manner, Adam addressed Anthony. "You say you had twenty other men with you?"

"Yes sir," replied Anthony. "And right now, I'd think they're trying to regroup. I can't raise any of them on comms through this interference."

"Alright," conceded Adam. "Stay with me. We'll work on trying to get your men back in order. And, make sure they know we're all on the same side."

"Sounds good," the commander responded. "Now what shall Samus do?"

Samus ended the conversation as she got up and headed back out the hatch. "What I do best."


	7. All That Remains, Part I

Chapter Seven

"Cool," Samus remarked to herself, inspecting her Arm Cannon carefully. According to her Visor display, her Arm Cannon's shock absorbers were up to the task of handling heavier firepower once more.

As this occurred, she stood at a place deeper in the forest, a place simultaneously welcoming and foreboding. A rock facade stood before her, nicely framed by the invasive vines and thick foliage. Strange, but to Samus, vaguely familiar, carvings adorned its weathered and cracked surface.

SCAN VISOR DATA: Scan complete. Chozo script translated. Scan data recorded to Logbook for further review.

It read,

"We, the Chozo, land here on this planet for the purpose of civilizing this land and taming its resources. We detected no indigenous sentients, but if we missed them, we wish to inform them that we mean no harm. In recognition of this event's rarity and stunning beauty, we have decreed in our charter that all actions made upon this paradise are to be for the mutual gain of both our race and this planet's pristine biosphere."

She returned to the present, spotting a hexagonal door in the facade underneath the carvings. A shot from her Power Beam proved the way to energize the door, and it slid neatly into the rock surrounding it to admit Samus into the area beyond.

The tan and brown stone continued into this expansive plaza; unfortunately, so did the invasion of nature. Large portions of the walls now served as boulders on the floor, the rock platforms hadn't aged any better. She surmised this room had once been three floors, with the solid slab of floor she stood on being all that remained of the top floor. Below her, reaching the length of the room, were the pieces of the second floor that remained attached to the crumbling walls. The collected rubble lay in a heap below, forever obstructing whatever was unfortunate enough to be down there.

Samus hopped off the top platform to the pile of rubble. From here, she observed an area on the bottom free of debris, and another door in the wall facing this free area. Another Power Beam shot energized this door, too, allowing her entry into a dimly lit hallway. The door slid shut behind her, revealing the only illumination source as the cracks in the ceiling letting in the sunlight. Hurriedly, worried said ceiling could cave at any moment, she ran to the other end, opening this door as well.

Another room greeted her here, a circular one this time. The far side of the room was occupied by a stage-like platform. Facing it, showing signs of heavy damage, were a series of descending concentric rings that occupied the rest of the space. Above, the roof had seemingly vanished, leaving only small chunks of what Samus guessed was a dome-like ceiling. More carvings graced the back wall of the stage area.

SCAN VISOR DATA: Scan complete. Chozo script translated. Scan data recorded to Logbook for further review.

It read,

"Our settlement has grown to triple its original size. Thus is the plentiful bounty of this planet, and why we must preserve it as we preserve ourselves. We can only hope for more good things to come for us, as we shall work at them and cultivate them. We can only hope for our descendants or anyone else that stumbles upon this planet to do the same."

Two more doors, one on each side, branched from the back wall of the stage platform. The one on the right failed to open with shooting, and a Missile proved ineffective in breaching it. Samus gave up and shot the left door, which slid open for her, leading her into the next area. This similarly large room expanded to the left of her, occupied almost entirely by ruined stone slabs.

SCAN VISOR DATA: These articles appear to be simple furniture for a small gathering. The carvings on the table indicate the most respected elders met here.

Then, on a tablet upon the table,

SCAN VISOR DATA: Scan complete. Chozo script translated. Scan data recorded to Logbook for further review.

And lo,

"We expand out from our new home here, ready to see what else this planet holds in store. We have found leftover runes from what could be a former indigenous race. We fear they are long gone, and pity we could not make an alliance with these people for the good of us both."

So there are more ruins, Samus wondered to herself. Apparently the Chozo found ruins left behind just as we found theirs.

Another exit, again shoot-to-open, took her to another ruined courtyard. This time, however, it featured some foreign objects of what appeared to be Galactic Federation origin. Scaffolds bridged the gaps between floor remnants. Floodlights graced the edges of the floors at intervals, their power cords snaking to a small metallic box that Samus could see was some sort of generator. More cords reached from it, receding into cracks in the walls to parts unknown. Apparently the Federation had just started taking interest in this place as an archaeological dig site.

Samus noticed the computer readout next to the generator. A note taped to the dead monitor read, "This Fuel Cell died on us and trapped some of our men deeper in the Ruins. The doors are without power, and unless they can get the old Chozo power generation systems back online, which is highly unlikely, we'll have to hurry to requisition another from HQ.

Without hesitation, Samus quickly tapped into her Suit computer a mission objective. "Further exploration of Chozo Ruins impossible without door power. Find a good Fuel Cell and bring to these coordinates."

A gap in the ceiling seemed to be the quickest way out, but none of the scaffolds reached high enough to reach it, and Samus didn't want to overstress her Space Jump right away. Instead, she backtracked. Heading back through the meeting hall and the auditorium/stage, she stopped back at the hallway with the precariously weakened roof.

SCAN VISOR DATA: This roof panel is made of Talloric Alloy. Aging and natural growth have weakened it significantly."

Without hesitation, Samus rolled up into the Morph Ball form, setting a Bomb to jump up to the ceiling, followed by another to destroy it. Rolling out of the way just in time, she avoided the collapsing mound of dirt and rock that now filled the hallway. She could still see, and make her way to, both of the doors, but the dirt formed a makeshift ramp for her to walk up out of.

But she realized, just as she disengaged Morph Ball, that she had done more damage than immediately evident. The repair progress bar for her Bombs flashed in her heads-up readout, and had dropped noticeably. "Damn," Samus exclaimed, "I'll have to be more careful next time."


End file.
